Indian’s Forged Series Wraps With a Wild 2025 Scout Custom

We know that Indian’s all-new 2025 Scout is either already available or on its way to dealer showrooms as we speak, but given the brand’s fondness for bike build-off contests, it should come as no surprise that early models were doled out to customizers months ago to drum up some buzz for the revamped platform. The resulting creations begat the Forged custom build video series, produced by Indian and featuring Roland Sands as the amiable host for the three-bike program, which just wrapped up its final installment.

In case you need a refresher on the finer points of the 2025 Scout, Indian was keen to highlight the bike’s brand-new 1,250cc V-twin engine, but perhaps more importantly, to emphasize the platform’s swap to a new steel tube frame, which offers customizers an easier path to modifications than the previous aluminum unit. The aluminum midsection and subframe were redesigned across the entire 2025 Scout series as well, which currently holds five models with three trim levels. With the Scout consistently charting as one of Indian’s most popular bikes, you could say the stakes for the new platform were pretty high.

Related: 2025 Indian Scout First Look

As far as the video series goes, the short of it is that Indian tapped three renowned builders to work on creating one-of-a-kind customs using the 2025 Scout as a base. The brand says the Forged series is meant to show how the next-gen Scout is a more approachable canvas for customization. Indian Design Director Ola Stenegärd explains, “Every year when we do the Forged program, we try to pick the right builders that can really show the diversity of the platform.”

To add a little drama to the proceedings, the builds would need to draw inspiration from iconic figures in the Scout’s 100-plus-year run, but other than that, the sky was the limit. To say that the resulting builds have turned out to be diverse would be an understatement, with the three builders cherry-picking different custom trends from a variety of eras.

Build number one went to longtime friend, part-time ambassador, and series host for the brand, Roland Sands, who conjured up a performance-based take on the Scout, dubbed the RSD Indian Scout. No surprise then, that Sands chose the 2025 Sport Scout as his base for the build, saying, “We’ve always taken cruisers and made them into sportbikes.” What also makes sense is that in this case, Ed “Iron Man” Kretz was the inspiration for the build. Given his rep as the builder of countless high-performance Indian racebikes, the RSD team felt a natural affinity with Kretz.

So Sands and company gifted the Sport Scout a set of FTR front fork and triple clamps, boosting braking performance via a switch to dual discs and radial-mount Brembo brake calipers. The rear end was modded to accept an FTR swingarm mated to Indian piggyback shocks and a Brembo rear caliper, and the RSD Scout now runs on RSD Dymag 17-inch wheels with sticky Dunlop Sportmax Q5S rubber. RSD fabricator Aaron Boss modified the front fairing to hook onto the new fork, switched up the stock foot controls. and tweaked the tail with new sides and an undertail tire hugger.

The lucky motorcyclist who gets to ride this beauty? That would be alternative band Twenty One Pilots’ drummer, Josh Dun.

Given her obsession with early American racing history, and as the only woman in the Forged series, Brittney Olsen had something different in mind for her Scout build. Olsen is the brains behind 20th Century Racing, an outfit focused on celebrating the racers of the 20th century while also crafting vintage bike builds, so it was fitting that she would choose Cecelia Adams, a female rider and racer from the 1940s, as her inspiration. Olsen’s bike would be built for outlaw country singer Nikki Lane, who just happened to share a love of vintage style—and motorcycling—with Olsen.

And Olsen really pulled out the stops to make the 2025 Sport Scout look period correct, leaving no part untouched. To carry the 1940s feel, she incorporated a hand-built girder front end to match the stock frame, using real 1946 to 1948 Indian Chief springs, shock, and risers on it. The Scout fuel tank was modified with stock Springfield Chieftain tank panels to achieve the teardrop shape, while custom laced 19/18 FTR rims were paired to the stock Scout hubs, with a custom vintage Bates seat and rear fender pad sitting on top. Other mods include an extended rear subfender, hand-built rear struts, custom stainless exhaust, one-off paint job and graphics, and much more. The result is a cohesively reworked, vintage-style custom, with subtly hidden modern underpinnings.

The third and final builder would be found overseas, with legendary Swedish chopper builder Ronna Norén of Unique Custom Cycles given the task of reworking the steel frame of the Scout Limited for fellow Swede and heavy metal drummer Mikkey Dee (of King Diamond, Motorhead, and Scorpions fame). Norén’s stripped-down build draws inspiration from Stan Dishong, an early adopter of the chopper scene in the ‘50s who—if he were alive today—would definitely recognize echoes of his own work in the new bike’s longer forms, narrow tank, taller bars, and dual exhaust.

The result is the first full-bore, frame-up custom in the bunch. The plan from the beginning, Norén says, was “to strip down the stock bike…make it as clean as possible,” so he stretched the frame and lengthened the fork a couple of inches, giving the build more negative space around the engine. The stock tank was sectioned and reshaped to be narrower, and spoke wheels of course, were nonnegotiable, with a big 21-incher up front to lead the way. The build is tidy, smooth, and beautifully proportioned, with a solid stance—nothing glitzy or ostentatious here. Roland Sands opined, “Simplicity’s complicated…especially when it comes to [applying a builder’s vision to] a modern water-cooled twin.”

For his part, Stenegärd’s beyond stoked. “Like all the builders took it in so many different directions—all the way from West Coast performance to old-school girder

to East Coast bar hopper…they really show that the platform can do it all which is really awesome. I can’t hope for anything else!”

For more info see indianmotorcycle.com.